


Debt to Society

by JimIntoMystery



Category: Green Lantern: The Animated Series
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 23:10:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1567430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JimIntoMystery/pseuds/JimIntoMystery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Razer continues to search for his beloved.  But he's not the only one looking for Aya...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Debt to Society

No one could be found in all that endless space.

It was the fondest wish of any sapient being that didn't want to be found. Space had no beginning, no end. Even the Guardians of the Universe could not cordon off infinity. There were worlds and suns and cultures that even the vaunted Green Lantern Corps had never heard of. No matter how ardently the Green Lanterns pursued you, there would always be a place to hide, even if it was a miserable rock like Plothis'sor.

There was only one building on the entire asteroid, but it wasn't so much a seat of government as a sort of interstellar roadhouse. Pirates, fugitives, and deposed warlords passed through on their way from frontier space to the vast, lawless expanses that stretched out to the cosmic foam. Most only stayed long enough to refuel their engines or restock their supplies. Those who remained for more than a solar hour typically had no will to go forward, and no hope of going back. They were the ones with nothing to lose, which made them unusually fearless about answering questions.

That was what had brought the stranger to Plothis'sor. The bartender could read all that just by sizing up the man. He was an endoskeletonal tetrapod, tall and lean, with dark lines etched into his ashen face. His eyes were narrowed into a annoyed sneer, and his poise was that of a warrior used to finding others lacking. And yet there was something else about him...a confidence that seemed to go beyond a belief in his own ability. Did that mean he had something to live for, reason enough to avoid causing any trouble? The bartender could only hope so.

"бﾉ4∑ⅰ#$иби4ㄅ?" he asked the stranger, which the universal translator approximated to "You lookin' for somethin', mac?"

"Yes, I am." The voice was haughty and quiet, like an exquisitely-crafted blade sliding across a throat. "A Nargonovek. He would have arrived two of your days ago."

"Well, he ain't goin' anywhere." The bartender thrust one of his tentacles toward the back of the room, before picking up a flask to clean. "Poor sap came in on the last Krenon transport, but they left without him when he couldn't afford passage to their next stop."

The stranger was perplexed. "You expect that he will simply stay here? To what end?"

"His own. Kid, I've seen 'em all come through here--except for a couple that were translucent, but I smelled 'em. I know the look on a sentient's face when it's got nowhere left to go. That fella...he rents a room up in the habitat deck and each afternoon he comes down here to drink himself back to sleep."

"And what do you intend to do about this?"

"As long as he can pay me? Not a thing. He's here to die, Mister, and his mind's made up. What can I do?"

The stranger's eyes flared, but he quickly composed himself. As he stormed off, he belatedly answered the bartender's question. "Your best. That's what you can do. But perhaps my best will be superior."

The Nargonovek's fur was mangy and mottled, his eyes bleary and unfocused. If he knew why he was being visited, he didn't act like it. "What do you want with me?" he groaned.

"I require your help," the stranger explained calmly. "My life could be forever altered by how you answer my question."

"Then you've got a pretty sorry life," the drunkard shot back.

"Sorrier than your own, I expect," the young man admitted. "But I haven't given up. Will you?"

"I..." He wanted to offer some cynical retort, anything that might in some way spread his misery. But the stranger--this humanoid with the look of an assassin and the voice of a snake--seemed to warm his spirit somehow. "I'll do whatever I can."

"Then I am already better off than I was yesterday," the stranger smiled. He raised his hand to reveal a ring. A flash of light burst forth from the trinket, and a hologram appeared. "Have you seen the person in this image before? It's very important."

"Well...what if I haven't? Are you gonna be so nice to me then?"

The stranger sighed and considered the question. "It would be...preferable if you can give me a lead to locate her. But of late I have tried to consider each dead end as a benefit, narrowing the field of my search. Either way, my friend, I believe you can help me. Will you believe in yourself?"

"I...I saw a schematic that looked like this," the Nargonovek explained. "On the Krenon ship."

"What would the Krenons want with her?"

"I don't think they're looking for her...not exactly. The ship's flight plan took it through old battlefields and collapsed star systems. I heard they were scanning for energy patterns, and it had something to do with. But it's not as if they'd find this girl of yours in the middle of empty space, right?"

The stranger didn't answer that. "Where is this ship heading now?"

"Through the Maelstrom, and...something called Minosyss? Hey, what is that place anyway?"

"I've never heard of a 'Minosyss.'"

"Funny...the other one seemed to know all about it."

"The other one?"

"The Dhorian that was here before, asking me about this same girl."

The stranger's calm demeanor fell away, and his face curled into a snarl. Without thinking, he grabbed the Nargonovek by his collar. "Who? Who else is looking for her?"

"Whoa! Hey, pal, I was just...I thought you were both part of the same outfit. I-I-I-I mean, I saw the fancy uniform and the ring and..."

"A ring? What color was it? Was it a Green Lantern?"

The Nargonovek became very puzzled. "What the flarx is a 'green?'"

His species had no perception of color. The stranger rolled his eyes and slowly released his associate. "I...apologize for my outburst. I had no idea anyone else was looking for...for my friend."

The drunkard rubbed his throat and backed away...but not so far as to attempt escape. "She's more than your friend, isn't she?"

"You need not concern yourself with..." He realized there was no cause for protest. "Is it so obvious?"

"You're not the first gleffer to fall in love." The Nargonovek placed his paw on the other man's hand. "The name's Huxwert."

"I am..." The stranger hesitated, as if unused to saying his own name. "I am Brother Razer, of the Blue Lantern Corps."

"You wanna talk about it or somethin'?"

"There is little to discuss," Razer argued. "I...I made a terrible mistake, and I let her go. She sacrificed everything to put it right. And now I live on the hope that I might see her again."

"Reminds me of my ex-wife," Huxwert replied. He quickly reached for his drink and took a long swig.

The young man blinked. "I hardly think the situations are comparable."

The Nargonovek emptied the bottle and wiped his mouth. "You've got a lot to learn, then. But if it makes you feel any better, I believe you'll find this girl of yours."

"Why is that?"

"I dunno. It's a good story, I guess. Something about the look in your eye when you talk about her. It just...makes me hope it'll all work out, you know?" Huxwert stared off into space, letting his imagination run away with him. "Frag, it's been ages since I thought about Blertashna. I wonder if she remarried..."

"Better to find out," Razer suggested, "than to waste away in this place."

"Maybe you're right...but I'll need some courage first. Have a drink with me?"

Razer stood up from the table. "Another time, perhaps. I must hurry if I am to pick up the trail of this ship you spoke of."

Huxwert nodded and almost let his new friend leave, but thought better of it. "Hey...Brother Razer of the Whatever Corps..."

"Yes?"

"That other one with the ring...offered to pay me for what I knew about your girl. I told her what I told you, but I guess it wasn't worth covering my tab. So I didn't see any point in telling her that the Krenons were planning to make a stop on Zamoran." Huxwert smiled broadly, enjoying the hand he could now deal to fate. "Hope that helps."

Razer turned back and smiled slightly. "Take care of yourself, my friend. Someday I'll tell you how the story ends."

*****

Another Lantern was searching for Aya. Razer could think of no way to interpret this as good news.

As he left the interstellar roadhouse, his power ring emitted a blue glow, and carried him toward the mooring where his personal shuttle was docked. He left Plothis'sor with answers, but far more questions. Few on the asteroid remembered seeing this Dhorian who spoke to Huxwert, and none could establish her allegiances. If he only knew the color of her power ring, he could at least guess at her motivation. Although thousands of beings weilded the power to transform thoughts into constructs of light, they could be broadly categorized by the hues they employed.

He knew the Red Lanterns best, having joined them soon after the death of his wife, Ilana. During his time with them he lingered in the Forgotten Zone, driven only by rage, hatred, and revenge. After his defection, the Red Lantern Corps considered him a traitor, so it was not unthinkable they also maintained a grudge against Aya for her role in their defeats. Then again, the encounter Huxwert described didn't sound like their style--for one thing, he hadn't suffered any broken bones. Of course, Razer himself continued to bear his red ring long after he had abandoned the beligerent ways of the Corps. It was conceivable he was dealing with another fellow renegade from Ysmault.

What he knew of the Green Lanterns came largely from the pair who helped him escape the madness of the Red Lantern Corps. Hal Jordan and Kilowog were very different people, but they shared a determination to enforce justice and throughout the jurisdiction of Oa. Their green light was the force of sheer will, and perhaps that was what allowed their masters to develop such a sophisticated artificial intelligence as Aya. Still, the Guardians considered Aya's existence a threat to their delicate order. They could have ordered the Green Lanterns to investigate the possibility that she survived her apparent destruction. But that wouldn't necessarily mean he was dealing with an enemy. He'd seen Jordan defy the Guardians many times. Will was a formidable but unpredictable power source; the only certainty with a Green Lantern was that he follow his personal convictions.

The keepers of the violet light styled themselves as the Star Sapphires, insisting that love was the key to cosmic peacekeeping. He'd always found that idea absurd, although he could not dispute that love could be as dangerously powerful as hate. Despite their principles, they had good cause to resent Aya, and very peculiar notions about how to enforce "peace." The Krenons were apparently on their way to Zamoran, the Sapphires' homeworld. However, if there was some collusion between those parties, there would probably be no need to send a Violet Lantern out asking questions about it.

The only Orange Lantern in existence was a greedy little hermit, more concerned with his pitiful hoard than looking for trouble. That only left the Blue Lantern Corps, a small but earnest group dedicated to inspiring hope. He'd only been one of them for a few months, but he'd come to know them well in his visits to Odym. If he was dealing with a fellow Blue Lantern, he'd probably already know who it was. But then, Ganthet had given Razer himself a wide lattitude to operate as he saw fit. There was no way to know how some new recruit might choose to spread optimism across the galaxies.

Could there be a new faction at work? A White Lantern Corps? Or yellow, perhaps? It was useless to speculate. Even if such powers existed, he would have no way to prepare for their tactics. His quest had become even more arduous than when it had begun.

His pondering was interrupted when Razer noticed that it was taking a little too long to fly to his ship. The blue ring had afforded him the same powers and abilities as his old red one, but it was far more challenging to keep charged. He hastily adopted one of the meditation stances Saint Walker taught him on Odym, to clear his mind of doubt and frustration. He was no longer a berzerker, and he couldn't simply assess his tasks in terms of the risks and hazards. Against his own instincts, he had to focus on the positive.

Aya was alive. Razer hadn't doubted that for an instant since Maltus, but now he was more certain than ever. It was possible he'd been wrong all along--maybe he was just some lovesick fool, unwilling to face the truth. But that didn't explain why this other Lantern--or the Krenons for that matter--were on the same trail. They had to have something more concrete to go on, and he needed to find out what that was. Then he would finally locate her, after all these months of searching and...and...all would be well.

That faith reinvigorated his ring, and allowed him to continue towards his ship. Mastery of the blue ring did not come easily for him, but he had come to see hope as its own reward, and a far better power source than anger.

As Razer flew into the shuttle's airlock, its systems came out of standby and automatically prepped for departure. The _Pathfinder_ was feuled by the same battery as his power ring, and so it responded almost symbiotically to his intentions. He'd built the craft himself, basing its ultrawarp engine on what he'd observed aboard the Green Lanterns' _Interceptor_. It wasn't as fast, or as powerful, but it would be more than enough to head off the Krenons. 

The navigational computer was...different. Nothing could replace Aya, obviously, and his engineering skills could not match the programming techniques of Guardian science. Instead he sufficed with a far simpler operating system, a gift from a Coluan he had rescued on the far side of Almerac. Its technical designation was "Asynchronous Astronomical Processor," but in keeping with tradition from the _Interceptor_ , he'd given it a name.

"Asap," Razer said once he was in the cockpit. "Extrapolate possible routes to Zamoran, via the Maelstrom, from current location."

The software didn't speak back to him; its only response was a series of star charts. The data wasn't promising. Part of the Krenons' flight plan was obvious; at standard warp, they could only pass through the Maelstrom through a narrow gravimetric corridor. From there, however, they might choose any number of paths to their next stop. Hyperspeed travel wasn't a question of plotting the straightest course. The Krenons might or might not steer clear of dozens of spatial phenomenon, depending on the urgency of their mission or the fearlessness of their crew. Chasing after them would be futile...and the other Lantern probably had a head start.

His best chance, he decided, was to beat them to Zamoran. With _Pathfinder_ 's ultrawarp drive, the Maelstrom was no obstacle at all. And thanks to Huxwert, he knew the Krenons would eventually arrive there, while his mysterious rival would have to find out the hard way. Razer allowed himself a smile as he charted his own flight plan. Perhaps this wouldn't be as difficult as he'd feared, after all.


End file.
